We are alert and ready, says Mayor Gilmore

Residents from Parry Town, St Ann cleaning their community last year to help stem the spread of chik-V.

Residents from Parry Town, St Ann cleaning their community last year to help stem the spread of chik-V

Residents from Parry Town, St Ann cleaning their community last year to help stem the spread of chik-V.

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Mayor of St Ann's Bay Desmond Gilmore has credited the anti-chikungunya work done last year to the near readiness of St Ann to deal with the possibility of a zika virus (ZIKV) outbreak, the latest threat from the Aedes aegypti mosquito.

The issue was top of the list at the parish council's emergency meeting on Tuesday, and according to Gilmore, the parish is on track to being prepared.

"We are alert and ready to go," Gilmore told The Gleaner yesterday.

"The things that we did in our fight against the chik-V are the same things that we need to do in this case, so some of the work is already done. We already trained a team of

volunteers, so it's just a matter of finding the resources and getting those persons back in the field. As a council, we have to be proactive."

The 70 volunteers, drawn from communities across St Ann, were trained in the latter part of last year and given basic information on the causes, prevention tips, how to identify and destroy breeding sites of the mosquito.

These persons will be deployed in the various communities and given the same responsibility as in the case of the anti-chik-V campaign last year.

Additionally, the council will be going into some high-risk areas to identify some of the drains that need cleaning at this time.